Laughlin v. State

• Citation: 85 P.3d 1125,139 Idaho 726
• Decision Date: 25 November 2003
• Docket Number: No. 28830.,28830.
• Parties: Chad W. LAUGHLIN, Petitioner-Appellant, v. STATE of Idaho, Respondent.
• Court: Idaho Court of Appeals

85 P.3d 1125

139 Idaho 726

Chad W. LAUGHLIN, Petitioner-Appellant, v. STATE of Idaho, Respondent.

No. 28830.

Court of Appeals of Idaho.

November 25, 2003.

Review Denied March 17, 2004.

Molly J. Huskey, State Appellate Public Defender; Charles Isaac Wadams, Deputy Appellate Public Defender, Boise, for appellant. Charles Isaac Wadams argued.

Hon. Lawrence G. Wasden, Attorney General; Ralph Reed Blount, Deputy Attorney General, Boise, for respondent. Ralph Reed Blount argued.

GUTIERREZ, Judge.

Chad W. Laughlin appeals from denial of his post-conviction relief application. After a hearing, the district court found that Laughlin's trial counsel was not ineffective in failing to raise in a motion to suppress evidence the issue of the extraterritorial arrest. We affirm.

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

In December, 1997, law enforcement officers in Jerome County received a complaint involving burglary of an automobile. A purse containing checks and credit cards had been stolen from the vehicle. The victim reported the stolen cards to the credit card companies, and was told that one of the cards had been used at a truck stop in Jerome County, not far from the location of the theft. A few days later, James Dotson was arrested in Twin Falls County on an outstanding warrant. Checks belonging to the victim of the automobile burglary were found in Dotson's possession.

Jerome County Sheriff Detective Daniel Chatterton was contacted by Twin Falls authorities. Chatterton thereafter interviewed Dotson at the Twin Falls County jail, where Dotson told officers that Laughlin had used the credit card at the truck stop. Chatterton performed further investigation of the burglary in Twin Falls County, without the knowledge or permission of any law enforcement agency in Twin Falls County. Specifically, Chatterton spoke with the manager of the Monterey Motel which is located in Twin Falls County. The manager informed Chatterton that the individual he was looking for was staying at the El Rancho Motel, just across the street. A vehicle matching the vehicle Laughlin was believed to drive was in the parking lot of the El Rancho. Chatterton met with the manager of the El Rancho and the manager stated that Laughlin was in room 8.

Chatterton, dressed in civilian clothes, outside his jurisdiction, and without assistance or permission from local law enforcement, went to room 8 and knocked. The door was answered by a man who matched the description of Laughlin. Chatterton arrested Laughlin at that time. At some point Laughlin was advised of his Miranda¹ rights and subsequently admitted he had used the card at the truck stop and had the victim's checks in his room. A search warrant was obtained for Laughlin's motel room and vehicle, and the stolen credit cards and checks were recovered. Additionally, evidence implicating Laughlin in other burglaries was also obtained.

Laughlin was charged with several crimes. Laughlin filed a pro se motion to suppress evidence found in the motel room and vehicle, arguing that Chatterton was not authorized to execute a search warrant in Twin Falls County, outside his jurisdiction. After a hearing, the district court denied this motion, on three grounds: (1) the Exclusionary Rule was not a proper remedy because Laughlin's substantial rights had not been affected; (2) any taint from an illegal arrest was cured by Chatterton obtaining a search warrant based, in part, on incriminating statements made after Miranda warnings had been given; and (3) Chatterton could have made a citizen's arrest pursuant to I.C. § 19-604. Laughlin entered guilty pleas to two counts of burglary, I.C. § 18-1401, and several misdemeanors, reserving the right to appeal the denial of his motion to suppress evidence. This Court affirmed the denial of the suppression motion in an unpublished opinion, State v. Laughlin, 135 Idaho 164, 15 P.3d 1172, Docket No. 25027/25028 (Ct.App. August 11, 2000). Laughlin filed a pro se application for post-conviction relief on August 13, 2001, alleging that his trial counsel provided ineffective assistance in failing to include in the motion to suppress evidence the issue of the extraterritorial arrest.² The district court denied the application after a hearing. Laughlin appeals.

II. ANALYSIS

Laughlin argues that: (1) Chatterton had no authority to make a citizen's arrest pursuant to I.C. § 19-604 because he was acting as a police officer at the time of the arrest; and (2) Chatterton had no power to make a citizen's arrest pursuant to I.C. § 19-604 because the information Chatterton possessed was obtained through police methods, rather than as a private person. Because Chatterton had no authority to make an arrest of Laughlin, the evidence gained from the arrest was subject to the exclusionary rule and required suppression. Laughlin contends that, without such evidence, he would not have been convicted and therefore, trial counsel was ineffective in not raising this issue at the suppression hearing.

In order to prevail in a post-conviction proceeding, the applicant must prove the allegations by a preponderance of the evidence. I.C. § 19-4907; Stuart v. State, 118 Idaho 865, 801 P.2d 1216 (1990). When reviewing a decision denying post-conviction relief after an evidentiary hearing, an appellate court will not disturb the lower court's factual findings unless they are clearly erroneous. I.R.C.P. 52(a); Russell v. State, 118 Idaho 65, 67, 794 P.2d 654, 656 (Ct.App.1990). The credibility of the witnesses, the weight to be given to their testimony, and the inferences to be drawn from the evidence are all matters solely within the province of the district court. Larkin v. State, 115 Idaho 72, 73, 764 P.2d 439, 440 (Ct.App.1988). We exercise free review of the district court's application of the relevant law to the facts. Nellsch v. State, 122 Idaho 426, 434, 835 P.2d 661, 669 (Ct.App.1992).

A claim of ineffective assistance of counsel may properly be brought under the post-conviction procedure act. Murray v. State, 121 Idaho 918, 924-25, 828 P.2d 1323, 1329-30 (Ct.App.1992). The relevant rules are laid out in State v. Mathews, 133 Idaho 300, 986 P.2d 323 (1999):

The benchmark for judging a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel is "whether counsel's conduct so undermined the proper functioning of the adversarial process that the trial cannot be relied on as having produced a just result." Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 686, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 2064, 80 L.Ed.2d 674, 692-93 (1984). The test for evaluating whether a criminal defendant has received the effective assistance of counsel is the two prong test found in Strickland. See id. Under this test, a petitioner must show both that: 1) his counsel's conduct was deficient because it fell outside the wide range of professional norms, and 2) the petitioner was prejudiced as a result of that deficient conduct. See id. at 687, 104 S.Ct. at 2064, 80 L.Ed.2d at 693. Under the Idaho Constitution, Idaho courts employ the same two-part test in assuring that a defendant receive "reasonably competent assistance of counsel." Aragon v. State, 114 Idaho 758, 761, 760 P.2d 1174, 1177 (1988) (quoting Gibson v. State, 110 Idaho 631, 635, 718 P.2d 283, 287 (1986)); see also Carter v. State, 108 Idaho 788, 794, 702 P.2d 826, 832 (1985).

....

In evaluating defense counsel's actions under the Strickland standard, we first address whether counsel's performance was deficient. To satisfy the deficient performance prong, the defendant is required to show "that counsel made errors so serious that counsel was not functioning as the `counsel' guaranteed the defendant by the Sixth Amendment." Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687, 104 S.Ct. at 2064, 80 L.Ed.2d at 693. Simply stated, the standard for evaluating attorney performance is objective reasonableness under prevailing professional norms. See id. at 688, 104 S.Ct. at 2064, 80 L.Ed.2d at 693; Aragon, 114 Idaho at 762, 760 P.2d at 1178; see also McMann v. Richardson, 397 U.S. 759, 770-71, 90 S.Ct. 1441, 1448-49, 25 L.Ed.2d 763, 773 (1970) (stating that a guilty plea cannot be attacked as based on inadequate legal advice unless counsel was not "a reasonably competent attorney" and the advice was not "within the range of competence demanded of attorneys in criminal cases").

In assessing the reasonableness of attorney performance, judicial scrutiny must be highly deferential and every effort must "be made to eliminate the distorting effects of hindsight, to reconstruct the circumstances of counsel's challenged conduct, and to evaluate the conduct from counsel's perspective at the time." Strickland, 466 U.S. at 689, 104 S.Ct. at 2065, 80 L.Ed.2d at 694; see Aragon, 114 Idaho at 760, 760 P.2d at 1176. The defendant making a claim of ineffective assistance is required to "identify the acts or omissions of counsel that are alleged not to have been the result of reasonable professional judgment. The court must then determine whether, in light of all the circumstances, the identified acts or omissions were outside the wide range of professionally competent assistance." Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690, 104 S.Ct. at 2066, 80 L.Ed.2d at 695; Aragon, 114 Idaho at 760, 760 P.2d at 1176. Moreover, "the court should recognize that counsel is strongly presumed to have rendered adequate assistance and made all significant decisions in the exercise of reasonable professional judgment." Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690, 104 S.Ct. at 2066, 80 L.Ed.2d at 695.

Mathews, 133 Idaho at 306-07,986 P.2d at 329-330 (emphasis added). This Court has long adhered to the proposition that tactical or strategic decisions of trial counsel will not be second-guessed on appeal unless those decisions are based on inadequate preparation, ignorance of relevant law or other shortcomings capable of objective evaluation. Howard v. State, 126 Idaho 231, 233, 880 P.2d 261, 263 (Ct.App.1994).

Laughlin's argument is premised on a finding that the arrest was illegal, therefore...